If NPR Is Correct, I’m Joining the Resistance

NPR is currently running a story that may yet reveal President Donald Trump’s worst move yet – a move that will negatively impact my life and the lives of many Americans.

If President Trump slaps a tariff on steel, the U.S. bourbon industry might be left reeling. https://t.co/MEEqutNmML

— NPR (@NPR) July 10, 2017

Trump has long vowed to impose tariffs on some imports, and his administration has recently focused on the steel industry. A blanket tariff on steel wouldn’t just hurt China, the frequent target of Trump’s trademark trade tirades. It would also deal a blow to allies such as Germany.

According to a report by The Financial Times (behind a paywall), officials in the EU are planning how they’d respond to blanket steel tariff. Their targets, the FT reports, include dairy, orange juice — and whiskey.

A tariff on bourbon, a classic American spirit that is produced only in the U.S., isn’t just symbolic. American whiskey has experienced a serious boom in global popularity over the last few years.

The bourbon industry fought hard for that global expansion, says Fred Minnick, the author of Bourbon: The Rise, Fall and Rebirth of an American Whiskey. For years other countries levied large tariffs on bourbon, he says, and the world thought “whiskey” meant “Scotch.”

“Bourbon distillers worked very diligently to peel away some of those ridiculous tariffs,” Minnick says, and successfully introduced American whiskeys to drinkers abroad.

This is where we must draw the line, friends. A great American product is in danger.

In all seriousness, this is why you don’t base your policies on getting back at someone. A tariff on steel isn’t just targeting China, but it affects other countries, and those countries will not be happy about it. It becomes a game of escalation, and Trump doesn’t have near the hand he thinks he does in a trade war.

I wish we had real leadership. I really do.

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